"Listen: Billie Pilgrim has come unstuck in time." The opening words of the famous novel are the quickest summary of this haunting, funny film. Director Hill faithfully renders for the screen Vonnegut's obsessive story of Pilgrim, who survives the 1945 firebombing of Dresden, then lives simultaneously in his past as a young American POW, in the future as a well-cared-for resident of a zoo on the planet Tralfamadore, and in the present as a middle-aged optometrist in Ilium, N.y.

Movie Tagline:
A Man Becomes Unstuck In Time In The Film That Became A Classic.

Paul Lazzaro: That corporal. He'll get back home after the war. He'll be a big hero. Dames'll be climbin' all over him. Couple of years go by, and one day there's gonna be a knock on his door and there'll be this stranger. "Paul Lazzaro sent me," the stranger will say and then he'll pull out a gun and shoot his pecker off. Stranger will give him a couple of seconds to think about who Paul Lazzaro is and what life's gonna be like without a pecker. Then he'll shoot him once in the guts and walk away. Yes.

Tralfamadorian speaker: We know how the world ends and it has nothing to do with Earth, except that it gets wiped out too. Billy Pilgrim: Really? How does it end? Tralfamadorian speaker: While we're experimenting with new fuels, a Tralfamadorian test pilot panics, presses the wrong button, and the whole universe disappears. Billy Pilgrim: But you have to stop him. If you know this, can't you keep the pilot from pressing ... Tralfamadorian speaker: He has always pressed it, and he always will. We have always let him, and we always will let him. The moment is structured that way.

Billy Pilgrim: [in his sleep] You guys go on without me. I'll be alright. Prof. Rumfoord: All he does in his sleep is quit, surrender, and apologize. I could carve a better man out of a banana.

Movie Trivia:

The aircraft used in the movie was owned by the 3M Company

Kurt Vonnegut Jr., author of the book this film was adapted from, was a Prisoner of War in World War 2. He was captured during the Battle of the Bulge while a battalion scout with the 106 Infantry Division on December 22, 1944, and used these experiences in his novel when Billy Pilgrim is captured by the Germans and sent to a POW camp.

In an early scene when Billy's mother is visiting him in the hospital, she is talking about Billy's Dresden experience to Elliot Rosewater - the title character from Kurt Vonnegut's 1965 novel, "God Bless You Mr. Rosewater", and a character who was later portrayed by Ken Hudson Campbell in 'Breakfast of Champions (1999)'.

Dirk Benedict auditioned for the part of Robert Pilgrim but director George Roy Hill preferred Perry King.

Sharon Gans was only six years older than Perry King, who played her son, and seven years older than Holly Near, who played her daughter.